Bird news and photos from Walthamstow Marshes & Reservoirs, Gulls on the Thames and birding further afield. Jamie Partridge

Dungeness 29/12/18

Probably my last trip to Dunge this year and albeit brief it was a decent one. My initial plan was to get out onto Lade sands at low tide and try and get some gulls together. However to my dismay there were only a handful of ‘large’ and everything else was chasing a fishing boat around a few hundred yards out to sea.

I pulled up on the road near the fishing boats and after throwing out a loaf or two I had about 50 large gulls around me including this 1cy CaspianGull.

Its really a nice bird to my eyes. The deep tail band with all that barring along with the long bill and large size…nice.

Whilst this bird was on the beach next to me I could see another 1cy following the back of the fishing boat, unfortunately this bird wasn’t seen again however I picked up a large barrell chested adult/4cy Casp flying my way. Alas i didn’t get the shots I wanted but these show all the stuff well enough I guess.

I thought perhaps the black spot neat the alula, black in the bill and amount in the primaries might be an indicator of it being younger than adult plumage but could be wrong. Nice grey tongue on p10 below.